The tissue issue:
McCloskey, Liz Leibold
violent army ready to step into Somalia: "First of all, the nec- priest, I had numerous conversations with him about this issue. essary logistics are difficult to mount," he writes, and...
...inherent connection to abortion...
...But in brought to closure, at least temporarily, it is not clear who has 1992, as the matter came up in the Senate, I began to have won and who has lost...
...They didn't quote much from mand for aborted fetuses...
...They THE TISSUE ISSUE never neglected to emphasize that it was a Reagan-appointed TAKE IT SLOW ON FETAL TRANSPLANTS advisory panel with some prolife members...
...This was also a sen- cept a therapy that, if proven effective, would require thousands timent with which I could not fully agree...
...The occasion was an address in Rome on October 31 by Pope Despite a detailed briefing by an NIH scientist about the lim- John Paul 11 to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences...
...The pope sounded this theme again on several occasions during the Late last fall unexpected headlines appeared in 1980s...
...No doubt, if Ambivalence is little valued when the vote the same panel had reached a different conclusion, research is taken and at the end of the day there is supporters would have charged that the panel was a political room only for unabashed celebration or morose lamentation...
...I was Star Tribune reported, "Pope Ready to Admit Church's Error not convinced by the scientific or policy argument that using in Condemning Galileo...
...cal force from acting violently...
...But deeper than the question of logistics, I was feeling a degree of uncertainty and discomfort that I had says Richard, is the question of how we think: "Our culture not felt before...
...I still find them challeng- potential therapies that would come from the use of fetal tising...
...The ease with which research proponents deA few weeks ago I went to a party in Northwest Washington nied any connection between abortion and this type of research held to celebrate the lifting of the ban on fetal tissue research...
...I regret that neither seriously en- delivered after the declaration of 1616...
...cies...
...Proceeding with caution would mean the pope's speech, and the quotations that appeared were not allowing fetal research to move ahead using tissue from elec- entirely consistent with the headlines...
...They on using federal funds...
...If the latter, not only tertained a third option: to proceed with caution and with open the question of an error in theology but that of a wrongful coneyes...
...Proponents dismissed the opposition by All the players were there: Congressman Henry Waxman (D- charging "political interference with science...
...from the men and agencies of the church...
...in the November 12 issue of Origins...
...But a proposal to study the feasibility of using fetal tis- Erred in the Case of Galileo...
...new conclusion, but rather produced several new scholarly pubSince Galileo has been dead for 350 years, and since everyone lications on Galileo by some of the commission's members...
...Was he reply another maneuver to stall research...
...Proceeding with open eyes would mean allowing fetal research What is really contained in John Paul's address and what while remaining conscious of, and uncomfortable with, its isn't there-needs to be better known...
...This approach, though, would have required conces- viction and punishment would need to be addressed...
...I repossible only where people were willing to put their own lives cently said in congressional debate, "This is not about taking on the line: "Only through this way," concludes Richard, "can lives, but saving lives...
...sues from non-elective abortions was soundly rejected by Knowing that the Catholic church rarely admits error, I was Congress and was seen by many research proponents as sim- intensely curious about what the pope actually said...
...bying to lift the ban never adequately addressed the symbolOn January 22, the day that President Bill Clinton issued the ic sanction of abortion that this research implied...
...But such actions were some good out of it...
...And a Catholic diocesan paper, the tissue from sources other than elective abortions was not fea- St...
...be supported...
...They lamentCalif...
...a committed prolife Senator and Episcopal curing people...
...who led the congressional charge to remove restrictions ed that the issue had become "mired in abortion politics...
...body with only an advisory role...
...some hesitation...
...Now that the ban has been lifted only one thing teaches us that only a physical power can stop another physi- is clear about my own viewpoint: I am ambivalent...
...And the ple suffering a variety of ailments describing the amazing bishops' letter and Eileen Egan...
...Fortunately a journalist tive abortions as well as ectopic and spontaneous abortions, friend in Rome sent me the Vatican's English translation of the but on a limited basis while continuing to study seriously the pope's address...
...Wouldn't it be preferable, in experimenting with Commonweal 26 March 1993: 5 fetal transplantation therapy, to rely on the tissue from spon- ory of the solar system, the news arrived accompanied by some taneous abortions and those occasioned by ectopic pregnan- unintended humor...
...But like the bishops' pastoral I had originally been swayed by the view that abortion was letter, Richard raises questions about this presumption and starts a separate issue from fetal tissue transplant...
...of abortions a year to sustain an adequate level of fetal tissue...
...PATRICK JORDAN sues...
...Perhaps this executive order lifting the ban on fetal tissue research, National research could be isolated from abortion and the abortion deRight to Life condemned his decision saying it would lead to cision, but could it ever be morally separated...
...Cloud (Minnesota) Visitor was no less blunt: "Pope: Church sible...
...Back in 1979, when John Paul broke a long-running official THE LEANING TOWER OF TRUTH silence on Galileo, the pope had in a sense settled the matter in ROUND UP THE USUAL SUSPECTS advance...
...As a legislative assistant from 1989 to 1992 for John C. Did we want to become dependent on abortion as a means of Danforth (R-Mo...
...else has long known who was right about the heliocentric the- But headlines to the contrary notwithstanding, nowhere in 6: 26 March 1993 Commonweal...
...began to bother me...
...There were also powerful emotional appeals by peoFor my part, that is a lot to think about this Lent...
...Ultimately President ferring to the church's 1616 decision to declare the Copernican George Bush authorized such a fetal tissue bank through ex- theory heretical...
...a decision that year the aging scientist was convicted by the Roman must be made as to whether to proceed or to continue to ban Inquisition of "vehement suspicion of heresy" for allegedly dissuch research...
...essary logistics are difficult to mount," he writes, and "currently, At first, I felt strongly that he should support lifting the ban on traditional armies are the only ones which have the required fetal tissue research...
...sions from the proresearch contingent acknowledging that we The newspaper stories purportedly supporting the headlines should be hesitant about the possibility of creating a high de- turned out not to be very helpful...
...informed consent for the tissue research could only be sought after a woman had made the abortion decision...
...Speaking then as now to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, John Paul praised "the greatness of Galileo" and then made the unprecedented admission that Galileo "had much to suffer...
...sue research, at some point, even in the midst of uncertain- Or was John Paul talking about Galileo's trial in 1633...
...I still felt out of place at this celebration and stayed only a short These slogans simply did not ring true for me...
...President Clinton has made the decision and obeying a papal command not to "hold or defend" Copemicanisin, Congress has approved it...
...The proposition that the sun was the center ecutive order, but it is likely to lapse under the Clinton ad- of the world and stationary was declared to be "foolish and abministration...
...It is not widely known that this commission did little John C. Danforth, is now a research assistant on the National original research on Galileo, that evidently no attempt was made Advisory Board for Ethics in Reproduction...
...The argument took a variety of forms: Abortion He mentions instances in Guatemala and Sri Lanka, in the is legal, and probably always will be, so we may as well bring Philippines and the former Soviet Union...
...No matter what by providing a number of examples of recent nonviolent ac- one's view on abortion, fetal tissue transplantation research could tions which successfully turned back violent, physical force...
...But by the time it came to a vote in 1992, logistical capacities...
...I understood them, but therapies...
...The panel had approved the research in December 1988 with certain safeguards: the tissues could not be sold for profit...
...As Senator Strom Thurmond [R-S.C...
...Judging ited usefulness of tissue from spontaneous abortions and ec- from the headlines, the pope's admission was, if not timely, at topic pregnancies, in which he argued that only a small least straightforward...
...And it was soon publicly available in the U.S., feasibility of using only tissue from non-elective abortions...
...a woman could not IN hat has always been true about politics is designate a recipient for the tissue...
...newspapers across the country: the Catholic church Now, in 1992, the pope obviously wanted to bring closure was at long last admitting its error in convicting to the new Galileo commission's work-which in fact never the seventeenth-century scientist Galileo of heresy included a systematic review of the issues with an eye to some for believing the earth revolved around the sun...
...Also: Accepting a donated organ from a new culture arise on the ashes of weapons and break the vi- a suicide or murder victim doesn't make suicide or murder acolent spiral of physical power...
...John Paul gave his thoughts on Galileo in the context of conLIZ LEIBOLD McCLOSKEY cluding the work of a Galileo study commission he had appointed Liz Leibold McCloskey, formerly on the staff of Senator in 1981...
...the Reverend Guy Walden, a prolife treated disagreement from members of Congress as an anminister whose own family had benefited from experimental noyance, necessary to placate prolife supporters, rather than fetal tissue transplantation therapy...
...proponents as a knockdown, clincher argument...
...In ty and ambivalence, public policy must be shaped...
...But as the issue of fetal tissue transplantation research is Earlier, I had been convinced by these arguments...
...The Minneapolis we shouldn't just do research with this small percent...
...Joan Samuelson, a Parkinson's respecting a genuine moral hesitation about the implications patient, who had toiled endlessly to see that research using fetal of medicine becoming dependent on abortions for lifesaving tissue be continued...
...Finally, proponents relied heavily on the recommendations of the Fetal Tissue Transplantation Research Panel...
...to reach a consensus, or that there really was no final report properly so called but only a short summary of the Galileo issue THE GALILEO FILE: STILL OPEN delivered by French Cardinal Paul Poupard, a member of the commission...
...The New York Times headline said clearpercentage would yield usable tissue, I began to wonder why ly, "Vatican Says It Was Wrong about Galileo...
...Could we ac"harvesting these babies for spare parts...
...That the panel approved so true it's a truism: when the votes are the research with only a few dissenting voices was seen by counted, there are winners and losers...
...and many others...
...surd in philosophy, and formally heretical since it explicitly Despite the limited parameters of the debate on fetal tis- contradicts in many places the sense of Holy Scripture...
...Since such claims had as yet no solid scientific support, all the more reason, proponents argued, to put scientists to work REPORT FROM WASHINGTON on the research...
...those lobwhile...
...ceptable...
Vol. 120 • March 1993 • No. 6
